Dirty diamonds hinted at $50m Argyle gem heist, but it would take years to catch the thieves

When former Scotland Yard police officer Richard Corfield got a call out of the blue from a diamantaire about illicit Argyle pink diamonds surfacing in Antwerp he knew something was up.

This was the first clue for the then head of Argyle security that diamonds were being stolen from its mine deep in the heart of Western Australia's Kimberley.

It was 1987 and the Argyle mine was well underway, producing more diamonds than the world had ever seen, including the first (and only) steady supply of coveted pink gems.

Mr Corfield said unpolished or rough pink diamonds shouldn't be available on the streets of Europe because Argyle polished its valuable pinks in its cutting and polishing rooms in Perth, near Kings Park.

"I said to him [the diamantaire], 'Keep your nose to the ground because it could be important'," Mr Corfield said.

It turned out that call was extremely important.

It was the first tip-off that Argyle was the victim of a massive diamond heist with the stolen loot later estimated to be worth up to $50 million.

Closer to home

The well-connected detective pushed on his contacts and soon got a second lead, this time closer to home.

Mr Corfield heard South African-born jeweller Noel Newton had recently opened up a diamond works in Perth, so he decided to pay him a visit to take a look at the gems he was polishing.

"He [Noel Newton] said, 'I've got some diamonds from Switzerland' and I asked, 'Can I have a look?'" Mr Corfield said. 

"He took out an envelope and tips them out and all of this Argyle dust drops onto the table.

As a matter of process, Argyle's diamonds were acid-washed on site in the Kimberley, but these gems in the Perth diamond-cutting shop were unclean.

The diamonds had been dropped off by horse trainer Lindsay Roddan, a name that was soon to become familiar to Argyle security.

But little did Mr Corfield know, Roddan was already well known to police and one of his security colleagues.

"I knew two things: that there was somebody suspected of having illicit diamonds in Europe and there were illicit diamonds in Perth," Mr Corfield said.

"There has got to be a connection … there had to be."

Realising he had unexplained pinks diamonds in both Europe and Perth, Mr Corfield rang a high-ranking officer to tell him he suspected both lots had been stolen from the Argyle mine.

"I couldn't get coppers interested enough," he said.

Before Roddan returned for his diamonds, Mr Corfield slipped five of the suspect gems out of the shop and had them tested to see if they had come direct from the mine.

Sure enough, they were Argyle stones.

Mr Newton told the ABC's Four Corners program in 1995, Roddan had got wind that Argyle security had taken the gems  from his diamond-cutting shop for testing.

"He knew before the stones were returned to me that the stones had been given to Corfield and they were at Argyle," he said.

"He boasted that he was very well connected; nothing went on that he didn't know about."

Mr Newton was never implicated in the crime. 

Although Mr Corfield had the name of a suspect, it would be years before the culprit and his accomplices would face trial for stealing the diamonds.

By then the pink diamonds were long since gone, suspected to have been traded on the black market, possibly ending up in some of the world's most valuable diamond collections.

Multiple police investigations, court cases and a WA royal commission into police corruption failed to uncover all the details of this audacious crime.

Some of Roddan's diamonds have recently been sold to a Perth jeweller and the story behind these illicit gems is revealed in the ABC's Pink Diamond Heist podcast.

A thwarted investigation

Robin Thoy was the officer in charge of the first investigation into the missing Argyle diamonds.

Soon after he was put on the inquiry, he got a warrant to search Roddan's house.

He said it was an interview he would never forget because Roddan insisted they speak in the toilet.

"I sat on the toilet pan," Mr Thoy said.

"He stood up near the sink and yeah it's the first time I've ever done that.

Mr Thoy started to monitor Roddan's movements in and out of Australia.

He discovered Roddan was sending diamonds to a big overseas diamond player, Swiss gem collector Theodore Horowitz.

Mr Thoy said despite promising leads, he could not get traction on the multi-million-dollar diamond case with his superiors.

"'I want you to kick a couple of doors in and write it off'.

"When you say that to a senior sergeant who has got a big inquiry … you don't … something's definitely, very wrong," Mr Thoy said.

Mr Thoy then decided to do something that was pretty extraordinary for a police officer.

He secretly recorded his superiors to protect himself against what he thought were inside attempts to ruin his policing career.

There are hours of tape of senior officers seemingly scuttling any leads Mr Thoy had.

The nexus: Alsatian fanciers

Veteran crime reporter Alison Fan came across Roddan many times at Perth's District Court.

She describes him as "a rough diamond" determined to make himself known to reporters.

It was a case of loose lips sink ships for Roddan.

Over coffee, Roddan mistakenly revealed to Mr Thoy that he had information that would suggest he had an insider at the Argyle mine.

Mr Thoy then started working through the list of Argyle security officers to check their backgrounds and discovered what he calls "the nexus".

He discovered Roddan and Argyle's head of security officers on site, Barry Crimmins, knew each other.

"I heard the Crimminses had a dog, a German shepherd, which they were very fond of," Mr Thoy said.

"So I rang the German shepherd club and spoke to the president.

"He said, 'Yeah Roddan and Crimmins, they're good mates, they come here all the time.'"

Argyle investigator Richard Corfield remembers how he reacted when he found out he'd been hoodwinked by a member of staff and that the two — whom he calls "Alsatian dog fanciers" — were connected.

"When Robin [Thoy] rang me I could have opened the floor and pulled the roof over my head," Mr Corfield said. "Yep, he [Barry] is in this up to his neck." 

"He would come out swinging his bags straight out of security and no-one would dream of stopping Barry.

You would think discovering the connection between Roddan and an Argyle insider — Crimmins — would have put fire under the Argyle police inquiry.

But it didn't. Mr Thoy's superiors instructed him to wrap it up.

The Argyle inquiry languished for years.

A failed love affair

The diamond heist fell apart in January 1993 when Crimmins' ex-wife Lynette confessed everything to the police after a volatile argument with her former lover — Lindsay Roddan. 

"She spilled the whole message, which was probably the best thing that ever happened to the Argyle inquiry, because she knew a lot of real, real lot," Richard Corfield said.

Barry and Lynette Crimmins pleaded guilty to conspiring to steal Argyle diamonds.

Roddan maintained he was innocent, but was sentenced to six years' jail in 1996. That was reduced to three years for time clocked-up in custody and home detention.

Lynette Crimmins not only took Lindsay Roddan and Barry Crimmins down with her, she also exposed members of the police force. 

It was her recollections of the people she met with Roddan that was even more explosive than the millions of dollars of diamonds stolen. 

Her memories would implicate high-ranking officers in the WA police. 

The police commissioner

Several years after Barry Crimmins first stole gems from the mine, Argyle Diamonds decided to have one more crack at retrieving some of the stolen loot.

They hired former Victorian police commissioner Kel Glare to look into the case.

Argyle tasked him with interrogating two things: the police investigations and its own mine security. 

"Their security wasn't anywhere near as good as they thought it was, unfortunately," Mr Glare said.

His investigation took him down a well-trodden path for investigators in the Argyle case. 

Mr Glare headed to Europe to sniff out the trail of the stolen diamonds. 

This led him to speak to diamond merchants in Antwerp, Geneva, London and Paris.

But he said the diamond merchants of Europe were more than happy to be left in the dark as to their source of illicit Argyle pink diamonds. 

"That seemed to be the attitude of anyone involved in the diamond trade," Mr Glare said.

"No-one was too concerned about the provenance of diamonds. They were just concerned about whether they could make a dollar out of them."

Mr Glare didn't manage to retrieve any stolen Argyle diamonds from Europe. 

But back in Australia, he put the WA police investigations under the microscope and found them lacking.  

"There seemed to be too much of a connection between Roddan and some of the police that became involved," Mr Glare said.

He spoke to police officers involved in the investigations including whistleblower Robin Thoy.

"He was treated very poorly … he really hadn't been given the opportunity to do what he felt he should do as a sworn police officer," Mr Glare said.

"It was an unfortunate incident in the history of Western Australia Police, no doubt about that.”

Despite this, the 2002 Royal Commission into WA Police found it was impossible to conclude there was sufficient evidence of any corrupt attempts by police to terminate the Argyle investigation.

Find out more on the ABC's Pink Diamond Heist podcast.